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| AP: Videos Show Guantanamo Prisoner Abuse |
| 2005-02-02 |
| EFL. Look! G.I. Joe's beating up that Osama Bin Laden with Kung Fu Grip doll! SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Videotapes of riot squads subduing troublesome terror suspects at the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay show the guards punching some detainees, tying one to a gurney for questioning and forcing a dozen to strip from the waist down, according to a secret report. One squad was all-female, traumatizing some Muslim prisoners. Oh, my heavens! Although the report cited several cases of physical force, reviewers said they found no evidence of systemic detainee abuse, according to the six-page summary dated June 19, 2004. An official familiar with the report authenticated it, speaking to AP on condition of anonymity. AP also reviewed an unclassified log of the videotape footage. So...ummmmmmmmmmmmmm...what's your point? The tapes raised questions about mistreatment and misconduct, however, said the investigators, who suggested some clips needed more scrutiny to rule out abuse. The military has cited 10 substantiated cases of abuse at Guantanamo, and announced Tuesday an extension would be granted for an investigation to interview of witnesses in the United States and abroad. Keep digging until you find something! Anything! One such clip the investigators flagged was from Feb. 17, 2004. It showed "one or more" team members punching a detainee "on an area of his body that seemingly would be inconsistent with striking a pressure point," which is a sanctioned tactic for subduing prisoners. In five other clips showing detainees who appeared to have been punched by team members, the investigators said: "The punching was in line with accepted law enforcement practice of striking the pressure point on the back of the thigh to temporarily distract the detainee." Again, your friggin point here? In other "questionable" cases, reviewers said a video showed a guard kneeing a detainee in the head, while another showed a team securing a detainee to a gurney for an interrogation. A separate clip captured a platoon leader taunting a detainee with pepper spray and repeatedly spraying him before letting the reaction team enter the cell, reviewers wrote. Investigators also noted about a dozen cases where detainees were stripped from the waist down and taken to the "Romeo block," of the camp. No female guards were involved, they said. Romeo block is a camp section where prisoners were often left naked for days, according to two former detainees, Britons Shafiq Rasul and Asif Iqbal, who were released last year. Although no female guards were videotaped in any of the stripping cases, investigators cautioned the U.S. government about using the all-female team to handle disruptive detainees, citing religious and cultural issues. Many of the prisoners are Muslim men and under strict interpretations of Islam view contact with other women other than their wives as taboo. We kinda think it's against our cultural beliefs to behead and disembowel people. But how DARE we offend their cultural beliefs! "Several detainees express displeasure about female MPs either escorting them, or touching them as members of an IRF team," the report says. "Because some have questioned our sensitivity to the detainees' religion and culture, we believe that talking points are appropriate to address incorporation of female soldiers into the guard force." Oh, fuckin PUH-LEEZE!!!! In one video clip of the reaction teams, the memo says, "A detainee appears to be genuinely traumatized by a female escort securing the detainee's leg irons. In another video, inexplicably an all-female IRF team forcibly extracts a detainee from his cell." While stating that female troops have a right to serve as equals alongside their male counterparts, investigators warned the all-female team could create the perception that the gender of the squad was taken into consideration for the Muslim population. Who are these "investigators" by the way? The Board of Directors of CAIR? "By forming an all-female IRF team for use with one detainee we potentially undercut our position that we do not distinguish between male and female soldiers. Clearly, the soldiers' gender did play a role in forming the all-female IRF team," the memo says. Hey, Mahmoud. We're sending in the chicks to kick your ass again. The memo suggests that military "personnel showing the IRF videos outside of (Defense Department) channels should be prepared with talking points to refute or diminish the charge that we use women (against) the detainees' culture or religion." The U.S. military wouldn't comment on whether there's a specific strategy involved in using an all-female response force but said female guards — who serve on mixed reaction teams as well — comprise about 20 percent of the guard force. "As a matter of policy, we do not discuss specific Immediate Response Force composition or methods, but they are consistent with those used in the corrections profession and are always carried out with the security and safety of detainees and troopers in mind," said Lt. Col. James Marshall, a spokesman at U.S. Southern Command. Prisoners released from Guantanamo have accused the extraction teams of abuse and one former U.S. National Guardsmen received brain damage after posing undercover as a rowdy detainee and being beaten by teammates. "The obvious problem with our armed forces is their inability to comply with international law," said Arsalan T. Iftikhar, national legal director for the Washington, D.C.-based Council on American-Islamic Relations. "Many of us thought that the Abu Ghraib scandal in Iraq was going to shake us into awakening but it seems like the things we keep learning about Guantanamo indicate there was, in fact, systematic abuse." Oh, there they are! Joe Navarro, a former FBI interrogator who has taught questioning methods and is familiar with Guantanamo, said treating prisoners poorly makes them more stubborn and unwilling to talk. Then feed them to the sharks. "The military has been cavalier in their attitudes toward these individuals to the point that it has been detrimental to the overall mission," Navarro told AP. Read all about it in my soon to be released book... The American Civil Liberties Union has filed a Freedom of Information Act request asking for all photographs and videotapes depicting the treatment of the detainees. Although a court ordered the government to comply with the ACLU request and turn over documents — thousands of which the ACLU has received — the government has refused to provide videos, citing privacy concerns, said Jameel Jaffer, an ACLU attorney. We're...ummmmmmmmmmm...working on it, Jameel. Although the extraction team actions are videotaped, interrogations with detainees aren't. The use of female guards and interrogators has created controversy. A former Army linguist who served at Guantanamo as an Arabic translator from December 2002 to June 2003 wrote in a draft manuscript that female interrogators tried to break Muslim detainees by sexual touching, wearing a miniskirt and thong underwear and in one case smearing a Saudi man's face with fake menstrual blood. The draft written by former Army Sgt. Erik R. Saar was obtained by AP, which reported on its contents last week. Eeeeeeeeewwwwww!!!! Yucky Infidel Temptresses!!!! About 545 prisoners from some 40 countries are being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, most accused of links to Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime or al-Qaida terror network. That's a lotta shark food. |
| Posted by:tu3031 |
| #19 I am tortured by the AP and the rest of the MSM. |
| Posted by: Crerert Ebbeting3481 2005-02-02 6:01:14 PM |
| #18 We can see it with a microscope. |
| Posted by: nanotechie 2005-02-02 8:15:39 PM |
| #17 I can chop all your infidel heads off but you will never see my peepee! |
| Posted by: Jihadist 2005-02-02 8:10:55 PM |
| #16 * Yawn! * |
| Posted by: DMFD 2005-02-02 6:08:54 PM |
| #15 In the immortal words of James Mason: "Some problems are best disposed of from a great height - over water." |
| Posted by: mojo 2005-02-02 5:27:32 PM |
| #14 i have an idea, when we are through interrogating them just shoot em in the head and push em the nearest hole let the ACLU bitch about that |
| Posted by: Thraing Hupoluper1864 2005-02-02 5:26:33 PM |
| #13 Now , now, JerseyMike. We must respect their multicultural diversity. You forget their standard of beauty is 5'0" and 100kg. Think of Suha in a Hefty bag. |
| Posted by: ed 2005-02-02 3:36:53 PM |
| #12 I hear some of those female CIA interogators down there are big fat Mamma's who are as nasty as they are ugly. Good. I still say shoot them all, the only good Islamist is a dead Islamist - problem solved. |
| Posted by: JerseyMike 2005-02-02 3:27:04 PM |
| #11 With the result that today many Egyptian men of a certain age remember being forced to drink a quart of hot chicken soup and feel vaguely guilty about something. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2005-02-02 3:26:12 PM |
| #10 Hell, worse than that JFM a lot of them Israeli gals were JOOOOOOOOS! |
| Posted by: Shipman 2005-02-02 3:23:36 PM |
| #9 Reminds me those photos of the Suez War: the Iraelis were so short of man power they had to resort to woman power for guarding their (thousands of ) POWs. Poor Egypatians, first their moms didn't love them and then that: being guarded by Israeli girls. |
| Posted by: JFM 2005-02-02 3:02:19 PM |
| #8 CAIR and the ACLU WTF? I know not one person who contributed to this story knows anything about prisons and their operation just from reading it.. They are just out to distract people from the fact these âprisonersâ are murdering terrorists. They are in what in a civilian setting would be a super max facility. The ACLU doesn't have a good track record when it comes to helping prisons be safe places for prisoners and the people who work there. An all female squad is exactly what you would want to get compliance. Their religious phobia is fair game for use against them. If they behave and do as they are told they don't have things they don't like done to them. Extracting a prisoner from a cell is dangerous and violently swarming the clown inside that isn't complying is necessarily violent. These "prisoners" would be in administrative segregation in the real world. They would be treated the same way if they didn't get with the program. No one thing I read is illegal in the âreal worldâ let alone a military prison setting. Freaking foolish people. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2005-02-02 2:55:43 PM |
| #7 One squad was all-female, traumatizing some Muslim prisoners. Ah, the sweet sounds of the press crying about American women beating up big bad Islamic terrorists. If I had the video I'd FedEx it straight to al Jazeera, the Arab world *really* needs to see this. |
| Posted by: Thraing Uloluper1664 2005-02-02 2:34:23 PM |
| #6 Well, let's make them a deal. If they behave, we won't send the icky girls in there to whomp their sorry asses, AND we'll give them ice cream too. |
| Posted by: Desert Blondie 2005-02-02 2:23:23 PM |
| #5 Crying wolf again. |
| Posted by: 2b 2005-02-02 2:15:14 PM |
| #4 Nick, nope just the blood thirsty actions of our drug-deranged MPs on the harmless prisoners. I love the 'all-women' team designed to 'hurt' the muslim sensitivities. This yahoo is a big commie reporter who gets all of his info from ex-prisoners and now a lone guard who heard (but never saw) about unusual interrigation methods. I bet he was the one wearing the mini skirt! Now that might may Achmed talk! |
| Posted by: Cyber Sarge 2005-02-02 2:00:39 PM |
| #3 I read through the entire article, and maybe I missed it, but I can't seem to find mention of what the prisoners actions were that caused the Immediate Response Force to be called in the first place. |
| Posted by: Nick 2005-02-02 1:48:08 PM |
| #2 Fly Chynna and the ladies of the WWF to Guantanamo to show these Masters of the Ummah what submission really means. |
| Posted by: ed 2005-02-02 1:43:29 PM |
| #1 hey i know, lets just throw marshmellows at them next time! |
| Posted by: legolas 2005-02-02 1:36:42 PM |